Your Right to Know

DEFIANCE, Ohio — Even a message written in chalk on a public sidewalk is protected free speech,
the American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio said Thursday as it warned the city of Defiance against
cracking down on political sidewalk-talk this Halloween.

The threat of “expensive and time-consuming litigation” stems from the city’s decision last year
to enforce an ordinance about damaging or disfiguring public sidewalks against Occupy Defiance
protesters.

“No matter which ordinance you may believe Occupy defied, prohibiting them from writing on the
sidewalk with extremely temporary, water-soluble chalk violates the First Amendment,” wrote James
Hardman, ACLU Ohio’s legal director, in a letter to the city. “Indeed, it is a content-based
restriction of political speech for which the city lacks a compelling governmental interest.”

He wrote that content discrimination was evident in that the ordinances were not enforced later
against children in a newspaper photograph as they drew pictures in chalk on sidewalks.

City Law Director David H. Williams said he believes the entire situation has been
overblown.